War, Nationalism, and the British Sailor, 1750-1850

Hardcover | September 15, 2009

Although there have been military, social, and labor histories examining sailors, this book employs the methods of cultural history to systematically integrate Jack Tar, the common seaman, into larger narratives about British national identity. If, as it has been argued, “Britishness” was defined in terms of one’s contribution to military efforts, why did sailors experience so much difficulty winning acceptance as Britons? Why was that acceptance delayed until the mid-nineteenth century? In pursuit of this aim, Land develops a new approach to sailors that moves beyond earlier historical work on maritime culture.

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Although there have been military, social, and labor histories examining sailors, this book employs the methods of cultural history to systematically integrate Jack Tar, the common seaman, into larger narratives about British national identity. If, as it has been argued, “Britishness” was defined in terms of one’s contribution to milit...

Isaac Land is Assistant Professor of History at Indiana State University. He is the editor of Enemies of Humanity: The Nineteenth-Century War on Terrorism, also from Palgrave Macmillan.

“In this engaging cultural history, War, Nationalism, and the British Sailor gives agency and new meaning to the lives of the men and women who sailed (or claimed to have sailed) during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. With adroit argument and elegant prose, Land reinterprets accepted maritime narratives and, as a consequence, forces us to re-consider what was at stake in the larger British context. By charting a course to bring maritime history ashore, Land deftly integrates the maritime into larger national narratives about British identity."--Mary Conley, Associate Professor of History, College of the Holy Cross and Author of From Jack Tar to Union Jack: Naval Manhood in the British Empire, 1870-1918.“Land’s argument – that ‘Jack Tar’ as a cultural product was born of the nation-building that began at the end of the seventeenth century and then disappeared after the sailing navy had accomplished its task in the early decades of the nineteenth century – is compelling and believable…This is a new argument, and it does a better job of explaining the changing role of the sailor in British national culture as well as the ambivalent feelings of those same sailors towards the nation-building project than any book I have read. Land uses a range of different sources to make his case, and in general displays great creativity in interpreting them…The author writes in a very lively and engaging manner. His use of anecdote, his portrait of the portside world, and his sense of humor and irony all combine to make this an excellent read.”--Daniel Vickers, Professor of History, University of British Columbia